Chile: The Hyper-Neoliberalism that Comes

I tried looking for another title, but this one fits right in, because neo-liberalism had already been introduced in Chile with the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. It were the still, remnants of Pinochet’s followers who celebrated the unquestionable victory of the right-wing last Sunday 17th, taking advantage of all the mistakes of the denominated progressive forces that cannot put aside their differences.

The outgoing president, Michelle Bachelet had called to exercise a voluntary vote in favor of the official candidate Alejandro Guillier, and civic against the neoliberal Sebastian Piñera, but half of the voters did not attend the poll rooms. The majority displeased with their presidency, which barely fulfilled some of the promises, had to ignore the most important and only attained social advances regarding the important task of protecting women and children.

But the latter is insufficient, when a Wide Front and other far-left elements did not value the Guillier’s candidature, before a calm Piñera doesn’t care a bit to make public mistakes, while he already announces neoliberal measures that, he assures, will improve all Chileans.

He had already mocked the program proposed by Guillier who planned to continue the reformations that Bachelet could not fulfill as well as a wide economic and social program that would cost nearly 10 000 million dollars, which, as it was known would try to collect with more taxes to the rich classes in such an unequal country where a simple administrator earns 30 times more than a worker.

Most of the achievements of the Chilean people in these years have been attained in the streets, thanks to massive mobilizations, now new ones and bigger loom ahead because of the hyper-neoliberalism that approaches.

Piñera a businessman with a 2 700 million dollars fortune, successful in the businesses he conducts. He is always keeps an eye on them and only averts his eyes to expresses his support to the current governments of Argentina and Colombia; while he criticizes the presidents of Cuba, Venezuela and Bolivia.

Despite saying in several occasions that he rejected Pinochet's continuity in power, the right-wing candidate cannot erase that, hence he was widely supported by Juan Antonio Kast, candidate of the former dictatorship defeated in the first round of elections, forced to escape from the National Stadium (where were gathered and murdered thousands of Chileans), where he was when Piñera’s win was taking place.

He recently assured that part of his government program will be focused in “greater austerity and expense reassignments.”

"It would be good enough if we can increase by one point the capacity of potential growth in Chile so that we can collect 7 000 millions extra in the coming four years. We have proven that we are able to make our economy grow”, he highlighted.

He also plans to reduce programs like Sense and Mas Capaz based on granting social helps of employment training, although he assured that “it’s not like we are terminating the programs, but rather reassign to efficient programs.”

Sebastian Piñera applied neoliberal agenda during his term and the new proposals for this process go hand in hand. He is a commercial engineer with mention in Economy at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile and has a PhD and a Master Degree in Economy at the University of Harvard, United States.

Militant in the reactionary party National Renovation, he ran for senator between 1990 and 1998. In year 2005 he vied against Michelle Bachelet for the presidency, representing to the right-wing coalition, back then it was known as "Alliance for Chile". He attained 46,5% of votes, that weren’t enough to win the presidency.

In 2009 he run for president again and in January 2010 he won with 51,6% of votes.

A letter of the right-wing filed in the pact "Chile Vamos" for these elections, always gave him as favorite. The opposition was weak, abstention was high and not understanding the power of a single vote, if counted, made forget the conflicts of interest for his role as businessman, the conservative politics promoted in his campaign and representing the national wing that supported Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship.

A lot will be said of the elected President, while his opponent rival, Alejandro Guillier, gloomily acknowledged his hard defeat and thanked those who believed in him, an approximate of 45,42%, against the 54,58% of Piñera, granted by half of the voters enabled to vote.